More racing
September 2nd, 2009 by Hannah MayhoRaced a lot since my last post! After Germany the next big race was Holland Hills, a UCI race which was really tough….basically, anyone who thinks Holland is flat would definitely change their mind after looking at the course! After only 4km disaster struck as there was a crash, which brought down my team mate Katie, who crashed into my back wheel. Thinking I was ok I carried on, then realised that my wheel had been damaged in the crash so I had to wait for a replacement. This took longer than expected as the car was back at the crash sorting out a spare for Katie, so in the end we both had to chase back on to the main group for a good 45min! I spent pretty much the rest of the race in the main group then after leading out my teammate Sharon into one of the climbs I finally cracked and was dropped, finishing in the second group in 50th place.
After Holland Hills, we had a hard week of training, with 3 races and hard training days in between to try and simulate the sort of fatigue we would be feeling in a couple of weeks time when we did Trophee d’Or, a stage race in France. In one of the races in Hoeleden I got another 2nd place to GB rider Joanna Rowsell, which I was fairly pleased about but disappointed I didn’t win.
After a tough week it was time to ease off a bit then make the very long journey to France for Plouay World Cup. On the way, during one of the service station stops I managed to get in touch with school to get my A level results! I got an A in Psychology and 2 B’s in Human Biology and English Lit, so was really happy…..and celebrated with….a Magnum ice cream!!
Once we got to our hotel for the race we met up with Olympic and World Champion Nicole Cooke who was also riding for GB that weekend, and went to look around the course. It was basically a 19km circuit which consisted of climbs and descents with very little flat in between, which was to be completed 6 times - so I knew it was going to be hard once it got to race day!
Saturday came and it was as expected - hard! It rained early on in the race which was pretty scary once it came to descending the hills! I finished the race after getting dropped in a group of about 20 riders - but we were too far down on the winners time to be given a placing.
From Plouay it was another long drive to Bourges where we had a couple of easy days then into Trophee d’Or.
Tags: cycling, France, racing, training, trophee d'or